This invention relates to computer animation.
Computers can produce animated video by displaying a series of image frames from a frame sequence file, much in the way a movie projector shows movies by rapidly projecting different film frames upon a theater screen. The process of producing a computer frame sequence file, however, can be tedious. For example, a user can position artwork on a computer graphics canvas, then repeatedly save the canvas image and manually reposition artwork.
Some three dimensional (3D) art programs use a 3D virtual camera to produce frame sequence files. After positioning 3D artwork objects in 3D space, a user can maneuver the 3D virtual camera through 3D space to capture images that reflect the 3D virtual camera's position and orientation. Producing images from a 3D virtual camera can be computationally intensive. For example, determining which 3D artwork object surfaces should be visible to the 3D virtual camera can consume considerable processing resources. Often a trade-off exists between the speed of image processing and the level of detail shown in the image.